Living in Death
by Tragic Aliza
Summary: When Paige figures out a way to meet Prue, Piper is accidentally thrown into the afterlife. Please review!
1. Default Chapter

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Okay, people, this is the first fanfic I've ever written, so please review – thanks!

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Paige ran down from Phoebe's room, almost tripping over the carpet at the bottom of the stairs.

"Phoebes! I just got the most fantastic, greatest, bestest idea ever!"

"Okay, calm down, Paige," said Phoebe, putting aside the newspaper she'd been reading. "What's up, sis?"

"Well, I was reading your diary –"

"What?! Why were you reading my diary? No, wait – why were you in my room?"

"Oh, well, I was looking for a brush – I couldn't find mine – and while I was looking, I saw the diary on your bed, so I thought, what the heck? I mean, I might as well catch up on all the annoying little-sister stuff that I missed when we were younger! – Which is why I'm telling you this great idea," she said, all in one breath, looking nervously at Phoebe.

"What great idea?" Phoebe might as well have had steam coming out of her ears, but she tried to keep her cool.

"Well, um...now, you'll forgive me once I tell you, you know –"

"Just tell me!" Paige jumped back in surprise.

"Okay, okay, cool your shoes! I just figured out how to meet my big sister."

"Big sister? You already have two of them!"

"No, the _big_ sister – Prue!"

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Okay, I promise to have more soon! 


	2. Living in Death2

Okay everyone, thank you so much for your reviews! I love to hear your feedback, so my work is the best it can be!

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"Phoebe, Paige, I'm home! Where are you guys?"

The two sisters heard the third calling from the front foyer.

""In the kitchen," called Phoebe, "I think you need to hear this!"

Piper rushed into the kitchen.

"Why? What's wrong? Are my babies alright? I left them at Daryl's, his wife was looking after them..."

"Dude, chill!" Exclaimed Paige. "Nothing's wrong, in fact, something's very right. _I_ figured out how to meet my boggest sister, and the answer was so simple!"

"Wait wait wait, back-up! You're talking about Prue?"

"No, Piper, I'm talking about Bozo the clown.:

Piper stuck her tongue out at her youngest sister.

"So, genius sibling, what's the plan?"

"Well, you know how when Prue died, you tried to get her back?"

"Yeah, so? I tried everything, you don't have a chance."

"Guess again, brainiac. Grams said that you couldn't see her because you didn't really think of her as dead, right? Well, you do now, I think, and I've already accepted it, so all you two have to do is state that she's dead, and we can go up to the attic and summon her! Got that, sis?"

Phoebe and Piper were staring at Paige in shock.

"Wait, why didn't we think of that?" Asked Phoebe.

"Never mind that we didn't, Paige did! Come on, let's do this!" Piper looked gleeful, smiling like her sisters hadn't seen since Wyatt was born.

"Well," said Paige carefully, considering that this was their sister they were dealing with, "You guys know what you gotta do."

Phoebe and Piper took a big breath in and said, "Our sister Prue is dead."


	3. Livng in Death 3

All right people, chapter three!

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The three sisters ran up to the attic.

"Oh my God, I can't believe we're gonna see Prue again," said Phoebe. Shestill couldn't imagine what the meeting would be like.

"Me neither," said Piper. "Ooh, wait! You guys summon her, I'll be right back up!"

"Where are you going?" Paige and Phoebe asked in unison.

"To get the boys! They'll probably want to meet their aunt, right? Oh, and Leo, too. Leo!"

Immediately, Piper's husband orbed in.

"Hey, what's up? I'm sensing some excitement, right?"

"Phoebe, fill in husband. Paige, do summoning. Me – get kids." With these words, Piper dashed out of the room to bring her children back up.

After Leo was quickly filled in by Phoebe, Paige began the summoning. She hurriedly placed the traditional candles in the correct places, then went to stand with Leo.

"Spirit from the other side, cross over from the great divide."

A small white dot came out of nowhere and appeared as Prue in the center of the candles.

"Prue!" cried Phoebe, starting to run over to her sister.

"Stop!" shouted Prue, holding her hands up. "Don't cross over the border of candles. Even though Paige was smart enough to know that you two had to make that statement –"she grinned at Paige, "- They still know that you don't think I'm really gone forever, especially with this meeting, so I can't come out of these candles for anyone – I'm a stuck spirit. And I don't want anything to happen to you, just in case you accidentally cross over."

Phoebe, Leo, and Paige took all of this in and backed away a little bit.

"Hey, I won't bite!"

Everyone laughed.

"Hey," said Leo, "Does anyone know where Piper –"

"Sorry I'm late, Chris had a bad diaper and – oh my God, Prue!"

Piper put her two sons into Leo's arms and ran over to give her sister a hug.

Paige tried to stop her.

"No, Piper –"

But Piper had already reached Prue, and gave her a giant hug.

"Prue," she said in tears, "Hi."

But Prue didn't respond. Instead, a gasp was issued from Phoebe, and Paige opened her mouth, but no sound came out.

"What? What's wrong?"

"Um, Piper," said Leo, "I think you might have...well, I don't know this for sure, but...did you just kill yourself?"

Piper looked around and saw the candles around her. Then she looked at her body – it had an almost misty quality to it.

"Um, yeah – can someone please tell me what the heck is going on?!"


	4. Living in Death 4

Thanks to everyone for the reviews! I know that the chapters are short, but I try to update ASAP! (Sorry I haven't updated over the weekend – I was in FL on vaca!) Okay, here's the fourth chapter!

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Paige, Phoebe, and Leo were all huddled around the Book of Shadows, trying to figure out what had just happened, while Prue tried to calm down Piper – she wasn't helping.

"Um, hello people! If you hadn't noticed, I've been dead for over an hour now! Some body get me out of here!"

"Piper," said Leo earnestly, "We don't really know if you are dead. You've got to try to calm down! We've tried everything we could think of: you tried to walk out of the circle but it bounced you back, we tried a summoning charm but that didn't work because you're already here, and Prue tried to go back up to, uh, wherever, but she got bounced back also. We're doing our best!"

Nobody had ever really heard Leo break down under pressure like that, and they were all stunned. Wyatt started crying.

"Oh, no, honey," said Piper, trying to nurture her son from across the room. "Don't worry, sweety, I'll be out of here soon, don't cry! Paige, make him stop crying!"

"Right!" Paige swung her body around the Book of Shadows and picked up a crying Wyatt. In a matter of minutes, he eventually stopped.

"Okay," said Prue, "Let's just look at the stuff we know: Piper can't leave the circle, and I haven't been able to leave the circle since Piper came into it. I have a theory, and –"

"Wait wait wait," interrupted Paige, "How the hell did you get a theory? You gae two obvious statements, and then came up with something. How? Explain!"

Prue smiled at the confusion on her youngest sister's face.

"Hey, don't worry about it. It's kind of like a power, unofficially. I guess it's because I'm head witch, I can think more clearly than the rest of you –"

"Hold up!" Interrupted Phoebe, "What do you mean, because you're the head witch? You're dead, remember? You're not a witch anymore! I mean, sure, you're still technically a witch, but it's not like you're –"

"Oh my God," said Prue, "Phoebe, you're a genius!"

Phoebe smiled.

"Yeah, I know – mind telling me why?"

"It was something you said – "

"Piper," said Leo, "I understand now. You'll be out of there in no time!"


	5. Living in Death 5

To those who sent me my amazing reviews – thank you thank you thank you! Now, I know that you're all anxious to see what the hell Prue and Leo figured out, so here you go!

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"Hold up!" yelled Piper. "I might be dead, Wyatt won't stop crying, Chris is snoring REALLY loudly, Phoebe can't figure out why she's a genius, Paige won't lift her nose out of the Book of Shadows, Leo and Prue figured _something_ out, and I'm confused! So unless someone gets me out of here FAST, I am going to blow something up!"

Chris gave a little snort, but continued sleeping.

"Yeah, um, sweety..."

"Don't you sweety me, Leo, just tell me what you two – "she gestured at he and Prue "– figured out, okay?"

"Well," intervened Prue, "In order to bring me back, you and Phoebe – the only two people in the world who never actually thought of me as dead – had to state that I was. It was a great idea – "she smiled at Paige "– but no matter what you guys might have _said_, you never truly thought of me as, well, gone."

"Well, that's kinda obvious," sneered Piper, "But what does that have to do with getting me outa here?"

"You see," said Leo, "Phoebe just said that Prue wasn't really the head witch, because she's dead and all; she doesn't perform magic anymore."

"Oh!" exclaimed Paige, catching on. "So, you're saying that Piper got sucked into some kind of vortex that makes her dead, because she didn't think that Prue was dead? Wait. This isn't making sense. Oh!" she exclaimed again, "I think I know how to explain this better!"

Paige ran out of the room, orbing back in only seconds later.

"Once again, Phoebe is a genius," she said.

"Wait! Why?!" Phoebe was confused enough as it was.

Paige pulled out from behind her a small red book.

"My diary," said Phoebe, "Give it back! You already looked at it enough today!"

"No, wait," said Paige, "Something else you wrote in here can help us out of this."

She flipped through the pages, then began to read:

_"It's now been a week since Prue died. I miss her so much! I still can't bring myself to understand why she was taken by that demon, instead of me. Why didn't that demon try to come after me, instead of Prue? It's so hard on Piper, too, she being the one that Leo saved, instead of Prue. She's having trouble with being the new older sister. And Paige never even met her, and she was such a great person, and an even better sister. Maybe everything would have been better if I had died instead of Prue."_

Paige looked up fro the diary, red-eyed and teary.

"Oh, honey," sniffled Prue, "You shouldn't think that! Do you really think that?"

"Not anymore – I only wrote that a week after you died!"

At the word "died," Piper flickered in, but only for a moment.

"Piper!" said Leo, "For a second there, you were, uh, alive!"

"Huh? Oh, never mind that – Paige, tell us what you're thinking," said a dazed Piper.

"It's just that, well, when you two didn't think of Prue as dead, Piper accidentally ended up becoming a, um, ghost, I guess. Anyway, now that Phoebe keeps talking about how you're dead – "She waved a hand at Prue "- Piper seems to be coming back to life. It would seem as though Piper was turned into a ghost because we resurrected a spirit, um, I guess you could say – prematurely. You know, before they were both totally healed."

Piper flickered again.

"Dude! I saw it that time!" she said excitedly.

"Oooooh..." said Phoebe, "I get it!"

After a long pause, she added, "So, uh, what are we gonna do now?"

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Don't stop here – there are still one or two more chapters to come! (Actually, I have some ideas to continue this story after Piper's ordeal is dealt with, but we'll just have to see where that goes, now won't we? ; ) ) 


	6. Overview for the confused

Okay, everyone seems to be really confused with what's going on in the story right now. For those of you that don't get it, please read these quick notes! If you do get it, you can skip over this! Thanks! Keep reviewing! Yeah! By the way, some of the things I may mention here will never actually be known to the characters in my story, but the Elders will know it, so I can still write it! – Let's just say that you'll know more than Piper, Prue, Phoebe, Paige, Leo, Wyatt, and Chris, okay? Good!

The only way for Phoebe and Piper to meet Prue again was to accept the fact that she was gone forever. Reasoning: when Prue first died, Grams had told Piper and Phoebe that they couldn't summon her because they hadn't yet accepted the facts.

When Paige realized this, she made Phoebe and Piper state aloud that Prue was dead, so that she (Paige) could finally meet Prue. However, what Paige didn't realize was that there are loopholes to this plan – emotions. You see, though Phoebe and Piper said aloud that their sister was dead, they still couldn't really accept that in their hearts.

Because of this loophole, Prue was only, shall we say, half-there; she could only be whole-there if everyone truly understood that she wasn't going to come back, and that they had to leave her in the afterlife (unless there was an emergency and they had to summon her, of course).

When Piper accidentally ran into the circle of candles, the Elders decided to punish the Halliwells (and Leo). Yes, I know, it wasn't very nice of them, but the Elders don't like it when people fool them, so they didn't really care! So, they decided that that would be the perfect opportunity to punish: make Piper into a passed spirit.

However, the Elders then realized that if two of the four Charmed Ones couldn't use magic properly (and were also scared out of their wits of what might happen to Piper), then the world was basically in trouble – especially Wyatt and Chris, who are the next generation of magic anyway.

And now, let our story continue to unfold!

PS – YES, I WILL CONTINUE THE STORY AFTER THE CURRENT PROBLEM IS SOLVED – NEVER FEAR, YOUR AUTHOR IS HERE! (da da da da da da...)


	7. Living in Death 6

I know, I know, the last chapter was a bit confusing, but if you thought that way, please read the overview for the confused!!! Alrighty then, let's move on with the story!

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"Piper," said Prue, "Am I alive?"

"No!" she said quickly, "You're a spirit, remember? I never thought you wee actually alive!"

Prue spoke again. "Okay, one down, one to go – how about you, Phoebe?"

"Well, whatever I subconsciously thought before, I obviously think that you're dead now, right?"

"Okay," said Leo, "So if you two have really accepted the facts, then why is my wife still a ghost?"

No one knew what to say - where did they go from here? They didn't want to hurt Piper accidentally, and they'd never heard of anything like this ever happening before!"

After a long pause, Paige spoke up.

"Um, I think this might be my fault."

Now, it was Piper's turn to speak up. "What do you mean? You never even met Prue before now – and what a way to do so – but since you never even knew her to begin with, how could you possibly think she was alive?"

"I didn't!" she said hurriedly, "At least, not _before_ we resurrected her. But, you know, now that she's actually here, how could I not think of her as alive? I don't know how to change my thoughts – how can we get you back if I can't change my thoughts?" She sniffled a bit – this whole fiasco was her fault!

"Well, why didn't you speak up sooner?" asked Phoebe, "We could've worked out a spell for you like that!" she said, snapping her fingers.

"Oh, well, I –"

"Never mind that," said Piper excitedly, "Let's get working on that spell! I have to use the bathroom!"

After a few minutes, Phoebe stood up from the table and held up a slip of paper.

"Sorry, it's not the greatest thing in the world, but I did it in the last twenty minutes!"

"Whatever, Phoebe," said Paige, "Just fix me, quick!"

"All right already, all right!

_Spirit from the other side_

_Come back to the real world before time flies._

_Fix the thoughts of a Charmed Sister's mind_

_So that this spirit will come back in good time._"

"Oh, no..." said Leo, but before he could tell everyone else what was wrong, Prue seemed to have been shoved out of the circle and into real life.

"Oh my God," said Phoebe.

"Oh my God," said Paige.

"Oh my God," said Leo and Prue together.

"What's the matter? You guys all look like a bunch of old worried people," said Piper happily, a smile on her face.

Wyatt and Chris both started to cry.

"Okay, enough with the crying!" said Phoebe, frustrated. "Where did I go wrong?!"

"I'll get the boys out of the way," said Leo, a worry line across his forehead. "I'll be back in a little while."

"You can't just leave us here," said Paige, "What kind of a white-lighter are you?"

"Yeah," said Leo, trying to escape the fury of Paige before she erupted, "I'm going now!" And with this last word, he grabbed the two boys and orbed out.

"Bloody white-lighters," mumbled Paige.

"Hey," said Phoebe, "You shouldn't be talking!"

But before Paige had the chance to give a witty response, Prue interjected. "Yeah, okay people, can we please figure out what just happened?"

"Oh, I know what happened, it gets me every time," said Phoebe. "Whenever I have to make a quick spell, I always forget to specify – I should have said _Piper Halliwell_ instead of spirit."

"What are you guys talking about? You girls need to stop fretting all of the time!" Piper said, pearly whites sporting a radiant smile – which didn't seem to fit the circumstance.

"Guys, something is definitely wrong with Piper," said Phoebe.

"Nonsense!" replied Piper, "I'll see you three in a bit!" Piper orbed out of the room.

"Um, where did she just go?" asked Paige. "And does anyone know how long a bit is?"

"She went up to the afterlife," said Prue, "And she probably won't be coming down any time soon."

Phoebe was aghast. "Why is my dead sister alive? Why is my living sister dead? Why did she go to the afterlife? How do we get her back? Why is she so happy? Why –"

Prue slapped her.

"Thanks. I needed that."

"No problem," said Prue. "Okay, first thing's first – let's figure out what's up with Piper's sudden mood swing."


End file.
